(a) Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a film holder and, more particularly, to a film holder having a flattening mechanism capable of flattening the film received in the film holder.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Due to the advancement in scanner technology, the function of scanning films is built in a typical scanner. When a user scans a film by such scanner, the film is usually mounted on a film holder, and then they are together inserted into the scanner to perform scanning. However, since the film is inherently curved with uneven surfaces which may cause the scanned image to be out of focus, it must be pulled flat when placed on the film holder.
FIG. 1 shows a schematic diagram illustrating a conventional film holder, and FIG. 2 shows a partial enlarged view C of FIG. 1. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the film holder includes a base 202 and a cover 203. The cover 203 includes a flexible arm 220 whose front end mounts a rubber contact plate 222.
The operating principle of the conventional film holder is described below. After the cover 203 is pivotally connected to the base 202, the friction effect occurred as the rubber contact plate 222 touching the film F may distort the flexible arm 220 to result in the displacement that allows for pulling the film F flat. Though the conventional design may flatten the film, its disadvantage lies in that the range of the displacement that allows for pulling the film flat is determined by the length of the flexible arm 220. In that case, the displacement is not enough to pull the film flat as the flexible arm 220 is too short; while sufficient friction effect is fail to be provided and the film scanning may be obstructed by the flexible arm 220 as the flexible arm 220 is too long.
Hence, according to the conventional design, the film, particularly with large size, may not be completely flattened to cause the scanned image to be out of focus